﻿<p>A spatial zone is a non-hierarchical and potentially overlapping decomposition of the project under some functional consideration. A spatial zone might be used to represent a thermal zone, a construction zone, a lighting zone, a usable area zone. A spatial zone might have its independent placement and shape representation.
</p>

<p>The <em>IfcSpatialZone</em> inherits and declares these attributes that shall have the following meaning:</p>
<ul>
 <li><em>Name</em>: A number or designator provided by the user or system for the spatial element, e.g. a space number "1-003", could also be a running number provided by default by the application</li>
 <li><em>LongName</em>: Name of the spatial element provided by the user, e.g. a space name "Office".</li>
 <li><em>Description</em>: Any additional description provided by the user, e.g. a space description "Corner office with habour view".</li>
 <li><em>ObjectType</em>: reserved for typing of spatial elements in case of <em>PredefinedType</em> = .USERDEFINED., restrictions on applicable values might be published in view definitions or implementer agreements.</li>
</ul>

<p>Physical elements that are referenced by this spatial zone are related using the <em>IfcRelReferencedInSpatialStructure</em> relationship as it is a non-hierarchical assignment in addition to the hierarchical spatial containment within a subtype of <em>IfcSpatialStructureElement</em>. Also spaces, that referenced by this spatial zone are related using the <em>IfcRelReferencedInSpatialStructure</em> relationship. The <em>IfcSpatialZone</em> itself can also be referenced by another spatial element using <em>IfcRelReferencedInSpatialStructure</em>.

<blockquote class="note">
NOTE&nbsp; The <em>IfcSpatialZone</em> is different to the <em>IfcZone</em> entity by allowing an own placement and shape representation, whereas <em>IfcZone</em> is only a grouping of <em>IfcSpace</em>'s.
</blockquote>

<blockquote class="history">
HISTORY&nbsp; New entity in IFC4.
</blockquote>
